Bill Called

Bill is a friend that I met through the work I do with adolescents. He worked for an adolescent drug/alcohol treatment center and I, at the time, worked for a school system that recognizes the impact drug and alcohol abuse has on young people.

Working with adolescents whose lives are touched by drug and alcohol abuse necessitates outside activities that renew the soul. Bill is a hunter, fisherman, and most recently a resort owner.

He and I would meet for breakfast to consult regarding students in the program. These meetings would turn to conversations of what each of us was doing that week, had done the previous week, or were looking forward to doing in the future. 

Bill would speak of a school house that he had moved to some property on a lake near Dent, MN. He would talk of goose hunting in Canada, ducks in Minnesota, and pheasant in Iowa. I would listen and reminisce about my youth, my uncles and grandfather, and about hunting for pheasant in Illinois.

I can still recall a pheasant that got up from the creek bed, flew over the cattle yard, and soared to clear the barn. My grandfather, with tobacco juice running down his chin, turned and took a 100 yd. shot.

I remember my Uncle saying, “Dad, you can’t hit anything that far....” The bird dropped on the roof of the barn, tumbled down the roof, and landed in the cattle yard. You guessed it, I ‘fetched’.

I remembered my uncle inviting in-laws and nephews to opening of pheasant and just hoping I would be included. Some of the corn might be picked, but row after row stood tall as we walked toward the men posted at the end. As a young boy my job was to be “the dog” and weave between the rows, never falling behind nor getting ahead of the men with the guns. I did a fair job of “fetching” but lost a few that ran on me!! My sense of smell has never been that acute!  

I remember learning from my Uncle Bud how to use the single shot 410 and receiving as a Christmas gift the gun my dad had used to hunt--a pump 20 gauge. I still tear up at the memory. My dad had died when I was three. Most would never know that it was not the gun that meant the most but that my dad had actually used the gun--it was his, had his experiences woven into the marred wooden butt, had his love for hunting reflected in the worn metal. It was not the gun but the man that I wanted to know. And now I had another piece of my dad’s story. He hunted, enjoyed hunting, and was (so I am told) a good shot. 

In 1968 I was drafted, sent to Vietnam, and returned 364 nights later (in crossing the date line each soldier received one day of “in-country status” which meant one day less in Vietnam). I returned to my wife and our apartment in Minnesota. I also returned to the guns I had managed to collect prior to being drafted.

I was a scared and scarred veteran. My experience in Vietnam with weapons had shown me what I could do with a weapon and what weapons in my control could do to other human beings. I was terrified of the anger I had brought back with me, frightened by a future that at that time said that those who returned from Vietnam were “scuzz” (“Would I be hated the rest of my life, stoned, or cast out?”), and terribly depressed. 

My own experience in Vietnam had assured me that the “conflict” (a word that minimizes the tragedy) was politically and militarily motivated and was being serialized in “WordSpeak” by politicians, military folk, media, and political opportunists.

Bill called, “Wanta go to Iowa hunting pheasant?” I hardly knew what to say. It was a call I longed for but did not want. I could not desert the romanticism of walking through stubble of corn, moving through tall grasses, and experiencing the fall as I had as a young man in Illinois. It had been 15 years since Vietnam. My reply surprised even myself! I said, “Sure, I’ll take a camera.” Bill said that I would need a licensed to be in the field and that he would take along an extra shotgun in case I changed my mind.

That weekend we drove late into the night arriving somewhere in Western Iowa around 11 pm, checked into a motel (with pheasant cleaning facilities, something I had never seen--feathers everywhere), and exercised the dog. The lot was filled with four wheel and four door vehicles with dog cages loaded in truck beds. That morning we arose, ate breakfast, and sped into the country looking for spots to hunt. Needless to say, I was excited and reticent. I wanted to hunt but I didn’t want to shoot.

We hunted for five seasons. During that time I became suspicious that she had been abused and beaten by her previous owners (I found out she had been returned to the breeder) and would be considered by most to be a “soft” dog. 

She had the instinct of a hunter but the previous owner’s training had taught her to be hesitant, reticent, and at times passive. She got birds up, hesitated to fetch them, and generally bounded about the field while I enjoyed the hunt, and I became frustrated that I could not have a “perfect hunting dog”.

Yet, I loved her beyond the capacity for a dog to accept love. 

She was my dog; I was oblivious and deluded about her abilities only because I loved her, loved watching her moving through a field, and loved the reunion I was having with my past and a sport long lost to me. She gave me tremendous love and affection. She was a pain in the ass. She was lovable. She refused to fetch birds. 

She and I hunted every weekend; geese, ducks, pheasant, and grouse. We did this for four years in rain, snow, wind, 30 below wind chills, and so on. We did this together and began to accept the role each of us played. I was her opportunity to do get out and into a field. She was my conduit to something I had given up and thrown away. 

In the fifth year of Suzy’s life, Suzy began “hacking” and seemed to have something in her throat. My wife took her to the vet who diagnosed Suzy with swollen tonsils. That evening, I noticed that her anus had extended so that a portion had been pushed out. It appeared that she had attempted to defecate and pushed her anus out. Having worked with a vet as a youth, I knew something was wrong and wanted the vet to check her out. We returned the next day. He took one look at her, felt her lymph nodes and said, “I am sure she has cancer but will do some blood tests and take a biopsy to confirm.” I had a taxi run the blood samples and a biopsy to the University of Minnesota as soon as it was drawn. I received the results the same day.

She had between one and six months to live depending on her response to medication. We chose to not take drastic measures such as chemotherapy or other experimental therapies. The quality of the life she had left was more important to me. 

That morning I called the vet and asked if he would come to the house to “put her down” (Another euphemism that parallels “conflict”). He agreed, arriving about twenty minutes later. He checked her over and confirmed that her pain was great and that the time for Suzy to die had come. We gave permission and the fatal dose was administered. He moved to another room while my wife and I held her and cried tears of sadness.

I still cry for Suzy.

Another friend that I had hunted many hours with came by the house with his dog, Chelsea. Chelsea and Suzy were hunting companions. 

Chelsea looked about the house and laid at the top of the stairs, whining. She knew and felt the sadness in our home. 

We had Suzy cremated and spread her remains in a special spot that she loved to visit with my wife and I. It is still our spot, not to be shared with anyone. 

I made the decision that no animal would ever touch me in that way again--the pain of the loss was too great to suffer.

We put the travel kennel deep into the closet, threw out gear, and began to get on with our lives. 

Bill called. He wanted me to accept a pup from the next litter his dog sired. I was touched and said that my loyalty was to Suzy and that I could not dream of having another dog at this time.

His gift was more than the offer of a puppy. It was of friendship and caring; it was the thrill of renewing a sport I had forgotten to enjoy; it was Suzy; it was finding myself.